City sued over bail practices

One more lawsuit going after the practice of jailing people who can’t afford to post bonf.

Two civil rights groups sued the city of Houston late Monday, alleging the city jail has detained people for days at a time without offering them a hearing to determine if there was probable cause for the initial arrest.

According to the federal civil rights lawsuit, those who experience the wait — which ranges from eight hours to several days — for their transfer to Harris County custody are individuals who can’t afford bail. The county conducts probable cause hearings, but the groups said the lengthy delay is woefully routine and is unconstitutional.

They are suing under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments — for violations regarding probable cause and due process.

The lawsuit states that in July and August hundreds of people were arrested and kept in the city jail for more than three days without being granted a hearing. Part of the problem is overcrowding at the county jail, which creates a bottleneck.

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The Civil Rights Corps, a criminal defense group based in Washington, D.C., and the Texas Fair Defense Project, an indigent defense advocacy group, filed the lawsuit in federal court in Houston. They’re seeking to have the case certified by a judge as a class action. The lawsuit also seeks compensation for individuals allegedly kept in the facility in violation of their constitutional rights.

Meanwhile, Harris County officials are awaiting a federal judge’s ruling on a motion to dismiss a separate federal case that accuses the county, sheriff judges and hearing officers of unfairly denying release to misdemeanor defendants who can’t afford their bail.

Last week, state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, filed a related judicial misconduct complaint against three hearing officers who have routinely denied release on personal bonds. Their behavior, described in a Houston Chronicle story last week, violated both judicial ethics and state law, he said.

Whitmire on Monday urged Harris County District Judge David Mendoza to immediately remove the three hearing officers from presiding over bond hearings.

Mendoza said he would present Whitmire’s unusual request to a group of district court judges for consideration.

Robert Soard, a spokesman for the county attorney’s office, said the law firm handling the county’s bail case had offered to provide offer free legal counsel to the hearing officers, if needed.

See here for the background on that. To get back to the previous point, it is my hope that the city will work towards a settlement rather than fight this in court. The Press has more.